Photograph of Squirrel Taking Time To Smell a Flower Goes Viral

“This curious ground squirrel started smelling and tasting the flower,” the photographer told SWNS. “I was really happy after capturing a photo like this.”

Dick van Duijn patiently took 2 hours and 200 photos, but it was all worth it for his priceless photo. He also traveled from the Netherlands to Austria got a photo of a squirrel smelling a daisy! The squirrel was evidently trying to find out which one would taste the best.

In the photos, the squirrel reaches for a yellow daisy, touching the flower to its face. Its eyes closed as it seemingly inhales the floral scent. Moments later, the rodent leaned in for a tasty bite, said the photographer.

“This curious ground squirrel started smelling and tasting the flower,” the photographer recalled. “I was really happy after capturing a photo like this.”

“I went to Austria especially to photograph the ground squirrels,” he added. “It was great to witness this, and very satisfying.”

Sometimes you’ve just got to stop and smell the flowers…even if you’re a squirrel. The series of photos show a squirrel taking a big whiff of a daisy and even hugging the flower before taking some nibbles out of it. But in reality, there is nothing better for humans than to stop and enjoy the creation.

“Stop and smell the roses” may be a cliché, but it is sound advice for finding satisfaction in life. A study in the Journal of Personality and Individual Differences suggests that appreciating the meaningful things and people in our lives may plays a huge role in our personal happiness.

Fagley’s survey of appreciation zeroed in on eight aspects of it, including awe, or feeling a sense of connection to nature or life itself,and living in the present moment.

The students in Fagley’s study also took surveys to evaluate their levels of gratitude and overall life satisfaction, and completed a standard questionnaire measuring what researchers call the Big 5 personality traits—openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism.

Past research has considered appreciation to be a byproduct of gratitude and one’s personality. This study shows that appreciation plays a significant role in one’s quality of life, independent of one’s personality or gratitude level—a role even more significant than previously thought.

Fagley is still researching how best to practice appreciation on a day-to-day-basis, she says. But for starters, she suggests that people focus on and value what they have, spend time outdoors, and reflect on their blessings and relationships with others.

“The challenge in fostering appreciation,” she says, “is that we want to periodically reflect on the positive aspects of our lives, value our friends and family, relish and savor the good times—without the practice of reflection becoming a rote habit or something that is taken for granted.”

I love the modern world; we have so many opportunities to be generous and inspire each other. But in the day to day it is easy to rush without paying much attention or taking the time to appreciate just how precious life is.

Sometimes, we should take a break from the fast track and slow down and look around us. When we slow things down, we find we have more time to do the things that really matter; we can look around and appreciate all the details; we feel connected with our own body, our own mind, with all the people in our life and with the world around us.